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Tuxedo Cake. It’s big. It’s delicious. It’s contrasty.

This is my “go to” cake recipe. This thing is so tasty and fun to make. The recipe comes from Rebecca Rather’s “The Pastry Queen” cookbook. If you are tired of buttercream icing and want something a little more fluffy and light, try this one out.

First grab your cake like ingredients. This one uses:

1 cup unsalted butter

2 cups water

1 cup canola oil

4 cups sugar

1 cup cocoa powder (unsweetened)

4 cups all purpose flour

4 eggs

1 cup buttermilk

1 tablespoon baking soda

1/2 teaspoon salt

1 tablespoon vanilla extract

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.

Put the butter, water, and oil in a pan and heat it all up.

Mix up the sugar, cocoa and flour in a large bowl.

Pour the butter mix into the dry mix and stir it all up. Then whisk in the eggs one at a time. Then the buttermilk. Throw in the baking soda, salt, and vanilla at the same time.

Split the batter into 3 9″ pans. Bake for about 40 minutes or until a toothpick inserted comes out clean.

Meanwhile….

Let someone you love lick the bowl. (Or just lick it yourself)

Put the cakes on cooling racks and let cool completely. I usually cook these at night and let them cool overnight.

The next morning get started whipping up your icing.

For the icing you need:

4 cups of heavy whipping cream

1 1/4 cups of powdered sugar

Whip the cream until soft peaks form, then add the powdered sugar and whip just a bit more.

Start by connecting your layers with the icing in between the layers.

Then spread the icing all over the cake. Put that sucker in the fridge and let it cool down and firm up for about an hour or so.

When the hour is almost up, grab these ingredients:

4 oz. bittersweet chocolate

1/2 cup heavy whipping cream

1/4 cup Lyle’s Golden Syrup

2 teaspoons of vanilla extract

Put the cream in a pan and heat it up to steaming, then pour it over the chocolate in a medium bowl. Stir until the chocolate is all melted, then add the syrup and the vanilla. Let this chocolate mixture sit for about 10 minutes or so. It’s tricky to get this timing right. If you pour it on the cake when it’s too warm it all flows down the sides and pools up, but too cold and it goes in clumps and doesn’t quite flow at all. You want most the drips to get about halfway down the cake or so. Enjoy!